Autor: Lonergan, Bernard J.F.

Buch: Insight

Titel: Insight

Stichwort: Relativismus, Relativist (Punkte 6-11); das Unbedingte: vituell - umfassend; das Konkrete: nicht-systematische Abweichung von idealen Frequenzen

Kurzinhalt: the unconditioned that is required for judgment is not the comprehensive coherence that is the ideal of understanding ... explanatory system has validity in the measure that it conforms to descriptive facts.

Textausschnitt: 367c Sixthly, if the foregoing fairly represents the relativist position, it also reveals its oversights. Questions are of two kinds. There are questions for intelligence asking what this is, what that means, why this is so, how frequently it occurs or exists. There also are questions for reflection that ask whether answers to the former type of question are correct. Next, the unconditioned that is required for judgment is not the comprehensive coherence that is the ideal of understanding, that grounds answers to all questions of the first type. On the contrary, it is a virtually unconditioned that results from the combination of a conditioned with the fulfilment of its conditions. Further, a judgment is a limited commitment: so far from resting on knowledge of the universe, it is to the effect that, no matter what the rest of the universe may prove to be, at least this is so. I may not be able to settle borderline instances in which one might dispute whether the name 'typewriter' would be appropriate. But at least I can settle definitively that this is a typewriter. I may not be able to clarify the meaning of 'is,' but it is sufficient for present purposes to know the difference between 'is' and 'is not'; and that, I know. I am not very articulate when it comes to explaining the meaning of 'this,' but if you prefer to use 'that,' it will make no difference provided we both see what we are talking about. You warn me that I have made mistakes in the past. But your warning is meaningless if I am making a further mistake in recognizing a past mistake as a mistake. And in any case, the sole present issue is whether or not I am mistaken in affirming this to be a typewriter. You explain to me that my notion of a typewriter would be very different if I understood the chemistry of the materials, the mechanics of the construction, the psychology of the typist's skill, the effect on sentence structure resulting from the use of a machine in composing, the economic and sociological repercussions of the invention, its relation to commercial and political bureaucracy, and so forth. But may I not explain to you that all these further items, however interesting and significant, are to be known through further judgments, that such further judgments, so far from shifting me from my present conviction that this is a typewriter, will only confirm me in it, that to make those further judgments would be rather difficult if, at the start, I could not be certain whether or not this is a typewriter? (Fs) (notabene)

368a Seventhly, however, the questions that are answered by a pattern of internal relations are only questions that ask for explanatory system. But besides things-themselves and prior to them in our knowing, there are things-for-us, things as described. Moreover, the existents and occurrences in which explanatory systems are verified diverge nonsystematically from the ideal frequencies that ideally would be deduced from the explanatory systems. Again, the activity of verifying involves the use of description as an intermediary between the system defined by internal relations and, on the other hand, the presentations of sense that are the fulfilling conditions. Finally, it would be a mistake to suppose that explanation is the one true knowledge; not only does its verification rest on description but also the relations of things to us are just as much objects of knowledge as are the relations of things among themselves. (Fs)

369a Eighthly, the relativist invents for himself a universe that consists merely of explanatory system because he conceives the unconditioned as the ideal of understanding, as the comprehensive coherence towards which understanding tends by asking what and why. But as we have seen, the criterion of judgment is the virtually unconditioned. Each judgment is a limited commitment. So far from pronouncing on the universe, it is content to affirm some single conditioned that has a finite number of conditions which in fact are fulfilled. No doubt, were the universe simply a vast explanatory system, knowledge of the conditions of any conditioned would be identical with knowledge of the universe. But in fact the universe is not simply explanatory system; its existents and its occurrences diverge nonsystematically from pure intelligibility; it exhibits an empirical residue of the individual, the incidental, the continuous, the merely juxtaposed, and the merely successive; it is a universe of facts, and explanatory system has validity in the measure that it conforms to descriptive facts. (Fs) (notabene)

369b Ninthly, the relativist argument from unending further questions is more impressive than conclusive. Human knowing does not begin from previous knowing but from natural spontaneities and inevitabilities. Its basic terms are not defined for it in some knowing prior to knowing; they are fixed by the dynamic structure of cognitional process itself. The relativist asks what is meant by the copula 'is' and the demonstrative 'this.' But neither he nor anyone else is given to confusing 'is' with 'is not or 'this' with 'not this'; and that basic clarity is all that is relevant to the meaning of the affirmation 'This is a typewriter.' A cognitional theorist would be called upon to explain such elementary terms; he would do so by saving that 'is' represents the yes that occurs in judgment and that is anticipated by such questions as 'Is it?' 'What is it?' Similarly, a theorist would explain 'this' as the return from the field of conception to the empirical residue in the field of presentations. But questions relevant to cognitional theory are not relevant to every instance of knowing. They are not universally relevant because, in fact, there is no operational obscurity about the meanings that cognitional theory elucidates. Again, they are not universally relevant, because such elementary meanings are fixed, in a manner that surpasses determination by definition, with the native immutability of the dynamic structures of cognitional process. (Fs)

370a Tenthly, as human knowing begins from natural spontaneity, so its initial developments are inarticulate. As it asks what and why without being given the reason for its inquiry, so also it sets off on the self-correcting process of learning without the explicit formulations that rightly would be required in an explanatory system. Single insights are partial. Spontaneously they give rise to the further questions that elicit complementary insights. Were the universe purely an explanatory system, the minor clusters of insights reached by what is called common sense would not head for a limiting position of familiarity and mastery in which evidently it is silly to doubt whether or not this is a typewriter. But in fact, the universe to be known by answering questions is not pure explanatory system. In fact, insights do head for limiting positions of familiarity and mastery. In fact, as everyone knows very well, it is silly to doubt whether or not this is a typewriter. The relativist would beg me to advert to the enormous difference in my notion of the typewriter were I to understand fully the chemistry of its materials, the mechanics of its construction, the psychology of the typist's skill, the twist given literary style by composing on a typewriter, the effect of its invention on the development of commercial and political bureaucracy, and so forth. But granted such an enrichment of my knowledge to be possible and desirable, nonetheless it is further knowledge to be obtained by further judgments; and since the enrichment is explanatory, since explanatory knowledge rests on descriptive knowledge, not only must I begin by knowing that this is a typewriter, not only must I advance by learning how similar other machines must be if they are to be named typewriters, but also I can attain valid explanation only insofar as my descriptions are exact. (Fs)

370b Eleventhly, it is quite true that I can be mistaken. But that truth presupposes that I am not making a further mistake in acknowledging a past mistake as a mistake. More generally, judgments of fact are correct or incorrect, not of necessity, but merely in fact. If this is something, still it might be nothing at all. If it is a typewriter, still it might be something else. Similarly, if I am correct in affirming it to be a typewriter, it is not a pure necessity, but merely a fact, that I am correct. To ask for the evidence that excludes the possibility of my being mistaken in affirming this to be a typewriter is to ask too much. Such evidence is not available, for if I am correct, that is merely fact. But if that evidence is not available, still less is there the evidence that will exclude the possibility of error in all judgments of fact. Errors are just as much facts as are correct judgments. But the relativist is in conflict with both categories of fact. For him nothing is simply true, for that is possible only when comprehensive coherence is reached; for him, nothing is simply wrong, for every statement involves some understanding and so some part of what he names truth. In the last analysis, just as the empiricist tries to banish intelligence, so the relativist tries to banish fact and with it what everyone else names truth.